The fun and routine of putting your kids to bed

Some years ago, I wrote a song that I would play on our old Yamaha keyboard for the kids before they went to bed. I honestly don't remember why I wrote it in the first place, or why it started to become a bedtime staple in our house. But I did, and it is.

Now before we go any further, I should make the honest disclaimer that saying "I wrote a song" is probably a little ambitious. I mean, it IS a song. And I DID write it. But in reality, it's just a short melody with a small bridge section. Playing it through once probably takes something like 30 seconds.

OK, wait, here's what I'll do: I'll run upstairs right now, play the song, and take a quick cell phone video so you can at least hear what I'm talking about. Here it is:

Sorry for the poor camera work in the second half of the video. Not only am I not a songwriter, I'm most definitely not a videographer, either. But you get the idea.

Anyway, the point is, this song has become a strange nighttime ritual for us. I've played it many hundreds of times since it was written (in, I think, 2005?) At first I did it for Elissa, Chloe, Jared and Melanie when they were little. Nowadays it's played only for Jack's benefit, since he's the first one to go to bed each night.

As you heard in the video, I like to put background music to it to spice things up a little. Sometimes I do it as a samba. The next night might be heavy metal. The following night could be ska or punk or country or whatever other musical styling our Casio keyboard (a definite step up from the original Yamaha on which the tune was written) has to offer. But it's always the same melody played in essentially the same way.

This got me to thinking about bedtime routines we parents have with our kids. As they get older, they of course start getting themselves into pajamas and brushing their teeth and all of the little activities they'll likely adopt for the rest of their lives.

But when they're little, you as Mom or Dad have to drive the process. You brush their teeth. You get them into pajamas. You tell them to go pee. And if you're so inclined, you say prayers with them. It can be time-consuming, but it's also very comforting.

I've always enjoyed bedtime with the kids because it's a nice opportunity to wind down from the day's whirlwind of activities and just spend a few one-on-one minutes with your child. When Elissa was really little, after she said her prayers, I would pretend to spread ice cream all over her and build "an Elissa Sundae," which I would "eat" off of her belly and tickle her when I was finished. She loved and always looked forward to it.

Now she's 19 and we don't do the Elissa Sundae thing anymore. Well, maybe she does it herself, in which case that's her own business and I don't want to know what weird, cultish bedtime rituals she's into.

Anyway, I would be most interested to hear what nighttime routines you all have, or what memories you have of routines with your own kids, or even from when you were a kid with your parents. It's not often we step back and realize how much our children will remember those night-in, night-out activities the rest of their lives.

Especially if they involve weird, synthesizer-based music or ice-cream-related tickling practices.